Tag: Mouraria

One thing that relates Poland with Portugal is that they usually show up next to each other in drop-down lists when filling online registration forms.

Silly stuff aside, they’re both catholic majority countries, which probably accounts for some of the recent increase in Polish tourists walking in the streets of Lisboa. Among them, were two very special visitors.

Kasia Szybka, from Warsaw, was visiting Portugal, invited by Turismo de Portugal – the government tourism office – to sketch the Pope’s visit to Fátima in the 100th anniversary of the apparitions of the holy mother. Pedro and I invited her to come sketch with us during one of our lunch hours. We took her to cozy and picturesque Largo dos Trigueiros for a coffee and a doodle. We shared a bit of dark humor and stories about our visits to each other’s countries.

Mateusz Hajnysz from Łódź came to visit western Algarve and Lisboa with his wife and two kids. Mateusz was the first sketcher I met in Manchester the day before the Urban Sketchers International Symposium kicked-off last year. We used the same Largo dos Trigueiros as the starting point of a tour around the Castelo hill, which saw us sharing tips on lighting in watercolor, how to sketch weddings and how to manage a local urban sketchers chapter. In the end, we came to the conclusion that both our languages had tricky and illogical pronunciation rules.

During the festivities of the Santos Populares, the districts of the old town of Lisboa get swarmed by hundreds of thousands of people, relishing on cheesy music, beer, bifanas and the traditional sardinhadas (the act of grilling sardines) that announce Summer as swallows do Spring.

In the heart of Mouraria, the residents of one particular building held a solidarity sardinhada to raise awareness to their dramatic situation. All 16 families living there were given an eviction order by the newly anointed landlord, who wants to capitalize the building as an investment product. While the city hall is moving to improve local infrastructures, few policies seem to prevent the current residents of the old districts of Lisboa from being evicted with little chance of retaining their homes or procuring a reasonably priced alternative, and so, any improvements in the area benefit investors alone.

While these residents are more outspoken in their protest – the action attracted the attention of a french camera crew and a few local politicians – their struggle is by far not unique, as the same kind of takeover is happening all around the city, in old and new districts alike. The dramatic result is that housing prices for purchase and rental are skyrocketing all around, becoming inaccessible to the local populations, especially for those who, like the tenants of the Rua dos Lagares 25, have lived their whole lives in the old town of Lisboa.

This old 16th century portal in the edge of the old town of Lisboa, in the area called Mouraria, aparently hides architectural and artistic treasures inside its doors. There’s a police station in what used to be a children’s hospital and later a home for orphan boys. Loads of stories – biblical stories – are told in the walls of the eight flights of stairs that go up the inner patio of the building, in the form of azulejo, the blue painted tiles that are so present in Portuguese monuments.

On the top edge of the Largo da Achada, there’s a sheltered alley with a staircase and a few private gardens in a public space. Space is seldom entirely public or entirely private in the old town of Lisboa. There’s also one of the dozens of casas de ressalto existing in the city. These are residential buildings, mostly hailing from the 15th century, with overhanging timber-framed floors, leaning over streets and alleys. A clever way of expanding your real estate, which finds its counterpart in the modern marquises. Clever, but dangerous, as most of these overhanging floors collapsed during the 1755 great earthquake. Despite legislation prohibiting them, they were promptly rebuilt, of course. They now pose picturesquely, waiting for the next big one.